A confident learner is a happy learner! Having confidence means being self-assured about your own abilities, it requires you to know your strengths and be able to apply those strengths in a way that's valuable and productive.
The majority of students go through stages where they experience self-doubt, especially when they find difficulty with new concepts or when they perform poorly on an exam. What's most important is that they don’t remain in this mindset for an extended period of time, and continue to believe in themselves.
Students who lack confidence in math have a tendency to question their abilities and avoid participating in class. As we discussed in last month’s blog, these students are easy to spot: they don’t make eye contact and can demonstrate uncooperative and inflexible behavior.
It is important for children to become confident in their math abilities. When they are confident, they don’t worry about making mistakes and they are more likely to challenge themselves by trying to solve more advanced math problems. Which in turn, helps them increase their math skills.
Kids may not possess the knowledge needed to develop their math confidence by themselves, but their parents and our tutors here at Mathnasium can use certain strategies to help build their confidence. We can help them recognize the depth of the knowledge they already possess and increase the level of effort they put into learning math. Last month’s blogs examined why so many students are frustrated by math, this month we will be discussing the importance of building their confidence and ways to actually do it so, STAY TUNED!
